The Loss (Zombie Ocean Book 4)

by Michael John Grist

  Salle walked back down the red corridor and took the stairs heading down. People went by carrying bags of soil, fresh potatoes, a sack of powdered milk, a coil of copper wiring. The Habitat was always on the move now just maintaining itself. A lot had been destroyed in the revolution, including large swathes of their seed stock and supplies.

  It got darker and damper as she went deeper. Atmospheric controls like sump pumps and dehumidifiers were a power luxury that ranked behind keeping the farm grow lights, irrigation and heating on. Eating took priority over comfort, and now half her genius scientists worked at some menial laboring task just so they could eat.

  On the second floor she found her old room. Cameras watched many hallways, as ever, but not here. She'd had them removed. 345C. Inside it was pleasant still, purple walls and velvet curtains, very different from her cell in Command. The TV worked, a luxury she allowed herself on the rare instances she visited, and she turned it on. It showed a view out over the ocean, once no more than a dull but calming screensaver. Now it helped keep her going.

  In this room she'd grown to love Lars Mecklarin deeply. Not a day went by that she didn't think of his last moment in the control room, and the last thing he said to her.

  "Think kindly of me."

  She had never quite figured out how that made her feel. Angry, yes. Pitying. On some level, understanding. He'd been the best amongst them, he'd seen the bright side in humanity and tried to nurture it. His view that all humans were just complex machines wasn't reductive, it was constructive; something to build on. It wasn't his fault they'd lied to him, and sometimes she thought he'd made the right choice in committing suicide.

  Lying on the bed, she picked up her copy of Amo's comic. It wasn't printed on the right kind of paper nor was it bound well, because every page was a screenshot taken from the agent's copy, harvested from the long days and nights he'd parade around his shitty little hallway surrounded by his torture victims, holding up Amo's work and scorning it.

  God, she'd hated him. Julio. Nothing had made her happier than to see his head torn off by Cerulean, except that it meant all the years of suffering he'd caused were for nothing. For years she'd sat in the control room alone with all her staff sent out, watching him rape, torture and enslave innocent people. It was sick, but surely the ends justified the means.

  Surely?

  Reading Amo's comic, for a time she could dream. For him suicide wasn't a selfish act, but a selfless one. He died for his sins, so the zombies might live on. She read and reread the pages again and again, as ever hoping something in it might bring resolve to the choice she'd faced for six years.

  Kill herself, or not. Kill her people, or not. Either one might be the right thing to do. When did dignity fade away completely and survival become worthless? She hardly knew what were they surviving for now.

  Reading the comic was a pleasant fantasy. She looked out her TV window and dreamed she was in Amo's shoes. She tried to imagine him in hers, and how he would fare in this situation. Would he kill himself, like Lars? Would he find a way to raise her people up with hope?

  Her radio buzzed.

  "They found a vehicle," Joseph said. "It runs. Commander, it's snowing again up there. It's beautiful."

  She didn't care. The real world wasn't as real as Amo's world.

  "Send them. They drive without rest."

  "Yes, sir."

  He hung up. Salle lay back and looked up at her ceiling.

  Now she had to kill Amo, along with all his bright, happy people. It had been coming for years. It was the strangest thing.

  * * *

  In a day the six caught up to the primary near Akron, Ohio.

  Salle stood at her command post in the control hall, watching it play out in split-screen. On the left was video from their cameras, a road and blue sky and the primary's running body ahead, framed by the windshield of their stolen Jeep as it gave chase. On the right was a GPS map showing the demon's blue dot and their red dots nearly overlapping.

  The primary didn't see them or sense them. The suits made them invisible.

  For twenty hours they'd been closing in, and already they were losing their minds. The suits' hydrogen line defenses were imperfect, letting just enough of the signal through to slowly turn their minds to jelly.

  "You'll be the advance party," she'd told them. "You'll go ahead of the primary and prepare his way."

  Lies.

  "They're on him," Joseph said. "Now's the time."

  She took over the controls. The command was keyed to a red box; one click of the mouse to unlock, one to activate. It was far less than the worst things she'd done. She took a moment to enjoy the view through the windshield of the racing Jeep; trees and clouds and such green grass.

  "Pull over," she ordered, and the message relayed directly into their helmets. The Jeep slowed and stopped. The primary ran on. "Step out of the Jeep," she said, and they did, where they wandered aimlessly across the road.

  It was time to betray them.

  She clicked the mouse twice, and six tiny clasps on all six helmets blew off in six tiny explosions. The helmets tumbled open, air rushed in and the signal transformed the bodies inside in seconds.

  Salle watched the change on the live feed from a camera mounted on the Jeep. Their helmets lolled down their backs, clanking off their oxygen tanks and battery packs. Their faces paled in fast succession, like lights blinking on. Their eyes sparked to a glowing white.

  Up ahead the primary stopped. It was reading them now.

  It came back. It hit the first and lifted him with ease, and Salle looked away. She watched the sky as six jaws broke, as six transformations happened, until seven of them stood on the road, echoed by seven blue dots on the map. One of them looked back at the camera, sending a chill through Salle's chest, then they all ran.

  "Was he looking at you or at me?" Joseph asked quietly. A joke.

  Salle left the control room without answering. Now they could only wait.

  11. HIT

  Seven demons are coming and we don't stand a chance.

  I scan the land ahead hungrily, hoping for something that isn't there. Distant red rock mountains encircle us, closed within a wide red desert plain of red dust, spartan cacti and spreading Pinyon pines.

  It's like a trap. I scan the satellite map but the next turn-off south isn't for fifty miles, and there's no way we can stay ahead of them riding rough in RVs across the desert scrub. We can't use the buildings or any other feature to our advantage, all we can do is crash ahead like a battering ram.

  But we can't crash through seven.

  We're going to collide head on; not a squeak or a scrape but an explosion. My mouth goes dry. It doesn't take a genius to see the way this will play out. Their massive, indestructible bodies will smash the first few RVs off the road, and the others will crash and pile up behind them like a Hollywood chase scene. Our tight formation will work against us. Metal will squeal and buckle, sparks will scrape off the raspy road, glass will shatter and the demons will stalk amongst the wreckage plucking out bodies to ravage.

  It'll be a massacre.

  One or two demons, maybe we could bull through. Not seven though. We're all going to die.

  The decision takes seconds to make and I make it without telling a soul, because there isn't time.

  "Ravi and Tomas, drive on!" I call into the radio. "Lara you're with me on the left."

  Then I lean over Chantelle and pull the wheel hard to the left. The RV swerves so hard it almost tips, then jumps off the edge of the road onto the rubbly, uneven desert scrub with a thump, coughing up thick bursts of dust to either side. The speedometer drops rapidly to eighty then seventy as the chassis thumps and judders, taking hits to the suspension and wheels it was never designed for. Under the onslaught Chantelle yanks control of the wheel back.

  "What the hell?" she shouts, echoed by cries from both Ravi and Tomas in the rank behind, now in the convoy lead. She tries to pull the wheel to the right and get us back o
n track but I put a hand on her shoulder and she stops.

  "Dead ahead, Chantelle," I tell her, "you understand?"

  She looks at me and she understands. "We're going to charge them."

  "We are." I allow myself a glance back in the side mirror to see our beige and white convoy tearing along the road. A second later Lara's RV peels off from the back and I send up a prayer of thanks.

  "Ravi and Tomas take the convoy ahead," I call over the deafening thump and rattle of the RV racing on the scrub. "You know what to do if I don't come back. Lara you're on me, you see what I'm thinking."

  "I see," she shouts back, "I wish you'd given us more warning."

  I see her in the rearview mirror now, her dark face at the wheel in the midst of a wide contrail of dust spat up all around her, features set and determined.

  "Needs must," I answer, and turn my attention to the open scrub ahead, as Chantelle swerves around craggy reefs of red rock rising like sharks' fins through the sand. The demons are damn close already, as big as tight ends and charging right at me. I'm charging at them.

  Screw them. These are the ones that killed my best friend. They're not going to kill my people.

  I start back down the RV's aisle while calling out instructions to Chantelle.

  "In twenty seconds you're going to stop," I shout, as I fumble in one of the shaking cupboards. More zip-ties tumble out, followed by purple and orange shell cases, rations, an oilcan, until I set my hand on the rack of smooth fat detonator nails. Thank God I took the time to program them already.

  I grab one and snatch up a box cutter with the other hand, slide the blade out and lurch to the first plastic crate. I flip the lid off, and just then the cold in my chest suddenly stabs more sharply, and Lucy by my side starts to wail like a siren.

  WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

  I feel the demons' need reaching out across the distance, like a snake mesmerizing its prey. It sucks at my thoughts and almost freezes me solid, but I've started and momentum carries me through.

  I slash the explosives' outer plastic wrap and peel it away, revealing the tender purple plastic explosive beneath it. Good at two thousand feet deep, guaranteed for twenty years, good to use now.

  "Stop now!" I shout at Chantelle and she slams on the brakes right in the path of the demons, tossing me off-balance and sliding the crates a few inches forward, toppling one noisily at the back. I grab the crate and recover. The demons must be half a minute away. "Get Lucy and we go."

  I plunge the smooth fat detonator nail, comprised of a primary explosive, accelerant and receiver into the purple explosive and flick the switch on top so it blinks red.

  The RV grinds to a skidding halt that turfs up a thick wall of dust ahead, blocking any vision of the incoming demons. Chantelle muscles by me, grabs the box cutter and slices Lucy free of her zip-ties while I dash forward for the radio. She kicks the door open and we pile out together, staggering and coughing in the dust.

  WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA, Lucy wails.

  "This way," I shout, catching a glimpse of white that must be Lara's RV through the billowing storm of dust. We run, and the freezing need in my mind grows irresistible, a siren call demanding I turn and run the other way. My legs become heavy and I look down at the radio in my hands and forget why I have it. I look over and find Chantelle has stopped moving, even Lucy is no longer wailing, they're both just frozen as the dust billows over them. Momentum abandons me and I too forget to run.

  In that vapid, overwhelmed state I watch the demons sprint out of the dust, almost on my RV. They are huge and muscular, long-limbed as aliens with great red heads and sunken features. Their black hole mouths reach in to unstoppable cores. In a way they are beautiful, and I marvel at their strength and fury. No wonder they deserve to inherit the Earth, no wonder we are all bound to bend the knee and open the mouth before them. Seeing them so close makes me I feel like I'm ready now, to join their evolution and remake the world. I open my arms to welcome them in, with popcorn and soda for all.

  "Amo, what the hell are you doing?" crackles the thing in my hand. I'm not sure whose voice it is or why it's coming out of my hand. Chantelle is walking back towards the RV now, holding a woman over her shoulder whose eyes catch mine and look thankful. She's thankful at the last and I understand why, because the fear is finally over and she has accepted her fate.

  My head spins and my heart thumps. I think of my brother Aaron, so long since I've remembered his name, and how he died in a collision with a car just outside our house. He'd been so brave, always teaching me how to be a better man, and then he was just gone. Whatever lesson I took from that was wrong, because it led me here, and resisting against this is futile.

  We can only bend and give way. It's all right. In a way all of these are my children anyway.

  "I'm coming, Aaron," I whisper, as tears roll down my cold cheeks. "I'm coming."

  "Amo!" screams the thing in my hand, while the first of them races past the RV, closing on Chantelle and Lucy. The cold has me in its grip like a fist, wrapped up as tight as Lucy's feet in their zip-tie padding, but something about that voice breaks through. It's a beautiful woman in a New York coffee shop, leaning over my shoulder and asking about zombies. It's a strong companion who finds me bleeding in the road and saves me, when I knew I was gone. It's a stunning, resourceful wife who gives me reason to live, who bore my children and loves them just as she loves me, who always deserves more.

  Her name pops like a bubble in my head, breaking the spell. Lara. Vie and Talia follow, driving the cold back far enough for me to breathe.

  I lift the radio before me, struggling to remember. I flip the dial on the radio, catch the correct frequency on the second go round and punch the big red button.

  BOOOM

  The first explosion is the initial crate blowing as the detonator bursts, and-

  BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM

  -the second is the chain reaction as all the crates in the RV, enough to level a whole city block or dig up an underground bunker, explodes. The blast starts close up and ends far away, blown into the depths of my eyes while I'm tumbling through the air then rolling over the abrasive sandpaper floor.

  It was so loud I didn't really hear it at all.

  I blink and there's fire, smoke and sand all around. The desert is on fire and my ears are hot and the sand in my mouth matches the hammering pain in my chest. I get to my wavering, wobbling feet, and still all I can see is dust and fire rising in a rolling ball into the sky, like a mushroom cloud. I look around. There's a radio in my hand fizzling but I can't hear a word it says. Did bodies fly through the air? Where are Chantelle and Lucy?

  Then I see him.

  He flows through the dust like oil, striding out of the explosion untouched. Dust furls either side of him like curtains on a stage, unblemished and vast and red. He is beautiful in his way, and his cold reaches out to gather me in, this thing that killed my best friend.

  I've used all my explosives, and now there is nothing I can do. He'll be on me in seconds. In the past I laid down and let the zombies take me, but this is nothing like that. Now I have children, a wife, a family of fifty-three and I can't let any harm befall them, nor do any harm to them myself.

  I snatch up the gun at my waist and bring it to my throat, flick the safety and-

  BOOOOOM

  There's a flicker of movement from the right as a rocket splits the distance between us and strikes the demon square in the chest. The burst throws him back, spinning into the ground and cartwheeling end over end into the burning crater where my RV was, while I am knocked again on my ass. The clouds bloom out and up like faces mouthing empty apologies, and afterimages of the blast only yards away replay across the dark in my eyes.

  I see Anna in there and Cerulean in the smoke, and I want to bury their apologies with my own.

  Then there are hands on my arms. I look up and see Lara, my beautiful Lara, and start to cry.

  "Come on," she shouts, though I don't hear a thing, onl
y see her mouth moving up and down. She drags me up and I stumble dizzily after.

  "Chantelle," I say, "Lucy."

  "Too close," Lara shouts back, "come on."

  We run and stumble over the scrub, while the cold from behind begins again, like an air conditioner suddenly turning on.

  Lara yanks at my arm, and I realize I've stopped and am staring into the dust, waiting, but there's nothing to wait for. No Chantelle, no Lucy, and the others? I know there were others, but they're not coming.

  Lara takes my face in her hands and looks in my eyes. "No more," she says enunciating so clearly I can't misunderstand. "They're gone."

  Then we're running again, and I see Lara's RV lights, shining white through the dust. Nearby there's Olly with the RPG on his shoulder, staring watchfully behind us. "Hurry up, come on," he hisses.

  I let Lara bundle me into the vehicle. The engine revs and jerks us away as soon as I'm on board, smacking me against the entrance well wall. My head is spinning and I'm dizzy, there's a high whine in my ears and sparks flash in my eyes.

  Lara presses something cold into my hand; a bottle of water. "Drink it," she says, or at least she mouths it, because I can't hear anything. I try to unscrew the cap but my fingers are too weak, smeared with some kind of oily dust. She does it for me and I take a swig as the RV bounces and flails over the desert floor and out of the dust.

  Cold water gets my throat working again, and I cough sand for a few hacking seconds. Lara presses a disinfectant wipe to my head and it comes away bright vermilion.

  "Shit," she hisses and I feel like laughing.

  "I just have to," I mumble and stumble past her, into the aisle of the RV.

  Through the windshield ahead there's the spread of desert and the black ribbon of road, blurry through my teary eyes. On the road in the distance there's the convoy, I can't count them they're so far, but it's a solid arrow of white and beige racing away.

  Good. That's good.

  Then I see the one on the ground, on its side by the edge of the black road, wheels spinning, scored with black burn marks where it rolled on the asphalt, dented and crumpled where the demon struck.